THE STORY - ADULT STUDY GUIDES
ZONDERVAN publishes a selection of texts from the New International Version in a book format, laid out in single column like a novel. Called THE STORY, it is a good way to introduce folks to the narrative sweep of the Bible without their having to wade through a lot of the legal and poetic material that often intimidates would-be Bible readers. Between actual biblical texts, the editors provide a summary in italics of the parts of the narrative that are not reproduced verbatim. When we decided to use THE STORY at First Baptist Church of Decatur, GA, several things had to be modified:
The study guides are attached in a zip file. You are welcome to modify and use them as you wish.
- We decided to do the Old Testament in the fall, the birth narratives for Advent, and arrange the winter/spring lessons so that the resurrection would fall on Easter Sunday. That meant that some of the OT chapters had to be combined and the NT chapters had to be stretched out over more than one week.
- Because of that, the study guides that Zondervan provided would not work for us, and anyway, the study guides were designed for a pre-critical approach to Biblical interpretation, which did not fit our needs.
- Finally, I had to buy the TNIV version of the books from another church because Zondervan has withdrawn that inclusive language version from the US market for political reasons.
The study guides are attached in a zip file. You are welcome to modify and use them as you wish.